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Wednesday, April 1, 2015

DIY Painted Striped Curtains

So.I have been searching high and low and
everywhere in between for some black and white horizontal striped
curtains.For months.MONTHS, y’all.You’d think they would be super simple to
find.That’s what Google’s for, right?Nope.I’m here to tell you that they do not exist.The only ones I could find were a pair of
panels on Overstock.com (you can find them here), but they only have 2 black
stripes and 3 white stripes, and I had envisioned a lot more stripes than that.

After months
and months of searching, I gave up and decided to make my own.Unfortunately, I’m not a seamstress (I can
barely sew a button on a shirt) so I decided to try and paint some.Pretty bold considering I’ve never attempted
to paint any fabric before, aside from puff painting some t-shirts and hair bow
back in the 90’s.Y’all remember puff
paint, right?! Anyway, without further ado, I present to you the perfect black and white striped curtains... and they weren't all that hard to make! You can make your own in just 10 easy steps.

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I found the perfect
white panels here
for only $42.99 for the pair. And I bought
the longer 95 inch panels (floor to ceiling) instead of the standard 84 inch
panels (floor to top of window), so if you want the standard panels, they are only $35.99 for the pair. Score!

Photo Source: Target.com

I also stumbled upon this
cool stuff called Textile Medium when I was researching what types of paint to use on fabric, and it actually turns any acrylic paint into washable
fabric paint.

Here are the
supplies that I used to paint two 95 inch curtain panels:

2 – 95 inch
white curtain panels from Target.com

2 – 8 oz. bottles of Delta Ceramcoat Textile Medium (I
purchased mine from Joann Fabric, but you can find it here if you heart Amazon as much as I do and want to shop online.)

I ironed both
of my panels before painting them so
I could have a nice, flat, wrinkle free surface to work with.If you’re anything like me, you may be overly
excited to get started on the actual painting and want to skip this step, but
trust me, you’ll be glad you didn’t once you start rolling on that paint.

Step 2 – Prepare Your Work Space

Lay out the drop
cloth to protect the ground, and then lay the curtain panel on the drop
cloth.My drop cloth was only wide
enough to paint one curtain at a time so that’s exactly what I did.Note, I taped the edges of the drop cloth and
the edges of the curtain panel to the ground because there was a slight breeze
and I didn’t want the wind to catch them and ruin my freshly painted
curtains!

Step 3 – Decide How You Want Your
Curtain Panels to Look

What do you
want your stripes to look like?Thick?Thin? White at the top? Black at the top?I knew I wanted a black stripe at the top
(excluding the very top thin strip containing the grommets), and a black stripe
at the bottom, and I wanted all of the stripes to be pretty thick, so I decided
to go with a total of seven stripes – four black, and three white all the same
size.

After making
these important decisions, it is time to do the math (Did somebody say math?
Zzzz.) so you know how thick each stripe needs to be:

90 inches
divided by 7 stripes comes to 12.857142 inches per stripe (of course it
couldn’t just be a nice even number), so I rounded down to 12.5 inches for each
stripe, which means that the bottom stripe will be slightly thicker than the
others.I worried about this a little,
but it is not very noticeable to the naked eye, I promise.

Step 4 – Measure, Measure, Measure

Now you know
that each stripe will be 12.5 inches wide, so it’s time to pull out your handy
dandy tape measure and mark each stripe.I made a small tick mark with my pencil at each 12.5 inch increment down
one side of the panel, and then I did the exact same thing down the other side
of the panel.

Once I had my
tick marks down both sides of the panel, I used the tape measure (you could use
a 2x4 or any other long straight edge) to draw a straight line between the tick
marks on each side of the panel.

Step 5 – Tape Your Stripes

Next, you will
need to tape your stripes. *Be sure to tape
outside the lines for the painted
stripes.*This will result in every other
stripe looking thinner while your tape is down.This picture below better explains it as it’s hard to put into words.

Also, please note
that if you run out of painter’s tape, regular masking tape will work in a
pinch.Oops.

Step 6 – Pull Up and Retape Your Stripes
Once You Realize You Did It Wrong the First Time

Optional step that
you hopefully get to skip ;o)

Step 7 – Mix Your Paint

The Textile Medium
instructions say to mix 1 part Textile Medium to 2 parts paint. Therefore, I mixed 1 bottle of Textile Medium
with 2 bottles of paint.This made the
perfect amount of paint to do 1 thick first coat and 1 thin second coat for one
panel.

Protect those knees! Bathtub kneelers are also good for projects that you have to kneel to do!

Step 8 – Paint!

This is pretty
self-explanatory.Take your roller, dip
it in the paint, and go to town!As
stated in Step 7, I painted the first coat really thick, and then added another
thin coat right after.I didn’t wait for
it to dry in between or anything, and it turned out great.

Step 9 – Let Dry and Peel Off Tape

Finally, go
tackle some other projects (or just rest if you’re not me) while your panels
dry.I let mine dry for about 3 hours
and then I peeled off the tape.

Step 10 - Hang

So what are you
waiting for??Hang and admire your work!

﻿

I hope this tutorial provides good, clear information without overwhelming you. If you decide to take the plunge and try these, let me know how yours turn out... I would love to see!

P.S. This is also a little sneak peek of my office that I'm making over. The big reveal is coming soon!

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Meet Lindsay

I’m Lindsay! Wife to Brian and Momma to Jacob and Olivia. Southerner. Georgia Bulldog. Red wine drinker. Cookie cake connoisseur. Music aficionado. Dave Matthews Band devotee. Friends fanatic. Travel enthusiast. Multi-tasking extraordinaire. Curator of pretty things. Lover of fashion and all things pink. Career woman by day and blogger, crafter, DIYer, and organizer by night. Welcome to my blog, where you’ll see the thousands of ideas that are always swirling around in my head finally come to life. I’m so glad that you’re here! ♥

*This post may contain affiliate links. This has been a humdinger of a week, y’all. It was only a four-day work-week and I feel like I’v...

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